


Arête

by bonehandledknife (ladywinter), Primarybufferpanel (ArwenLune)



Series: The Mountains Are The Same [6]
Category: Mad Max Series (Movies)
Genre: Blood and Violence, Gen, Podfic Available, Post-Movie(s), Puppy Piles, please see notes for further details
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-08-01
Updated: 2015-08-01
Packaged: 2018-04-12 09:35:47
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,988
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4474310
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ladywinter/pseuds/bonehandledknife, https://archiveofourown.org/users/ArwenLune/pseuds/Primarybufferpanel
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Arête: a sharp outward facing corner created by glacial erosion on a steep rock face. A method of indoor climbing, in which one is able to use such as a corner as a hold.</p><p>  <i>“Furiosa,” he yells, but it’s lost in the other voices and only she turns her head. When she tries to move towards him the Mothers both young and old cluck at her and sweep her onwards; after the confrontation with Corpus’s men she’s at the last of her strength. It galls her.</i></p><p>  <i>“Imperator,” he tries, but that only makes the women tighten up formation and funnel her faster towards safety, eyes darting around.</i></p><p>  <i>“Boss,” he asks, finally, formally, as they try to close the door to her room on him. And that makes her finally shove out from well-meaning hands, because she knows that tone. It’s one that Ace adopted, and that all her crew learned.</i></p>
            </blockquote>





	Arête

**Author's Note:**

> Graphic violence/gore warning: Furiosa did some pretty horrible things under Joe's rule, and some of them with the best intentions. If you want to skip the graphic/gore part, skip the italicized section that starts with _She once had a War Boy named Afterburn_

“Oh, but you shouldn’t have done that Furiosa. Slowly now—!”

“What were we going to do? Leave them there?” _a sharp hiss_

“Steady. There’s the rest of us too who don’t need to worry about reopening stitches, and your boy’s gone off into the wastes so its not like you have blood to spare.”

“He doesn’t either, at this point. And he’s not—” _another hiss_ “ Wha—why are we going _there_?”

“Duck under her arm, there, give ‘er some support— The pups say there's supplies, and I don't have clean gauze. “

“I don't want— Gale, _no_.”

“We won't leave you there, Chick, I promise. Just want to stitch you up and then we'll move you up to your room...”

 

* * *

 

Ace has been in the Mechanic’s Skin Shop for… he’s not exactly sure, but it’s sure as hell a lot longer than he’s ever been here before. The Organic Mechanic does whatever bodywork he deems necessary and useful, and then kicks you out to either heal or die. He doesn’t keep you around. If he does, that’s not necessarily a good thing.

The Organic Mechanic isn’t here. The two War Pup assistants don’t seem to know what to do with themselves, and for lack of anything better to do, Ace is still on the ledge where they parked him after he stumbled in.

The Citadel is emptied because they are after his Imperator. His Boss. Furiosa, who worked with him for years. Who shared herself with him in all the ways that count, or so he thought. Furiosa, whom he trusted in more than the usual alignment of goals. More than trusting her to act in the interest of Immortan Joe’s goals, he’d trusted _her_ \- to speak to him, let him help her in whatever way he could, to not spend him needlessly, to witness him when the moment came.

His ribs hurt, and being short of breath is exhausting, but there’s some sort of uproar outside, and the next time he’s able to focus is when several people enter the workshop. Several _women_. In their midst they have –

He doesn’t understand how she could possibly be back, she _betrayed the Immortan_ , she should be either dead or very far away. And yet here she is, eye swollen shut, face and side bloody, leaning on the shoulders of two older women and surrounded by war pups.

She sees him, and he can’t breathe at all for a moment, watching her hand stretching out to him as they lead her past his ledge and into the inner room of the workshop.

 

* * *

 

It’s Rachet who catches up with them, skin flaking with painted white on a surface that looks raw and scratched and sandpapered.

“Furiosa,” he yells, but it’s lost in the other voices and only she turns her head. When she tries to move towards him the Mothers both young and old cluck at her and sweep her onwards; after the confrontation with Corpus’s men she’s at the last of her strength. It galls her.

“Imperator,” he tries, but that only makes the women tighten up formation and funnel her faster towards safety, eyes darting around.

“ _Boss,_ ” he asks, finally, formally, as they try to close the door to her room on him. And that makes her finally shove out from well-meaning hands, because she knows that tone. It’s one that Ace adopted, and that all her crew learned.

“I know him,” Furiosa insists, and wobbles towards the War Boy. And he looks—

Looks—

 

_She once had a War Boy named Afterburn get an injury on his arm during a run. It’d been gouged up with the rusted edge of a spiked car, and the wound turned sour. Between that and the increased nightfevers, the Organic Mechanic hadn’t wanted to waste a bloodbag on him. It didn’t take a Mechanic to see that his half-life was draining quick._

_Furiosa had led him out of the chop shop when she heard. Brought him to their crew’s sparring area near where their machines was held in readiness and practice, and the room was full. It was noise and trashtalk, sparring and banter, as she walked him to an open area and told him:_

“ _You’re off the next run.”_

_The noise dropped, one and two mouths paused, open._

_She said, “I need every perch staffed and reliable.”_

_The silence grew._

_Calmly, loudly, “You will never be Witnessed, there.”_

_His eyes were huge and liquid and there was a collective gasp. Every Boy had stilled, heads turned towards them._

_Furiosa repeated herself, gently, “You will never be Witnessed,_ _**there** _ _.” She tightened a belt and shifted subtly to a fighting stance and Afterburn had glanced at her feet then up at her face. And she nodded as his eyes glowed._

_He rushed her in a burst of speed, looking to bowl her over but she pushed her feet backwards in a sprawl, pushing his body down with her weight, moving with his forward momentum. She kneed him twice in the head, and with a steel clutch his head and a clench at his shoulder, spins him around on his bad side, until he was on his back, straddled, with her hand at his throat and her metal fist, raised like a hammer, chambered._

_The room rises around them like a cup, like an arena, she saw him glance around at the War Boys roaring, for them, for him._

“ _WITNESS ME!” Afterburn shouted, face alight._

_Furiosa brought her left fist down through his nose, his skull a brief pop of resistance, until the weight of her punch was stopped when it rang against rock, the reverberation going up her arm like the chorus around the room._

“ _WITNESS!”_

_Her gut rose with the sound, like a drop of aqua-cola rising before it slumps back down into the ripples of a pool. Like the growing red around her._

 

–Furiosa had once had a War Boy named Afterburn. His face had been frightened and relieved, resigned and delighted.

—Rachet’s face looks the same. He looks like she might reach into his gut and grab onto anything with meaning and tear it all out when she retreats. And he would be _glad_ for it.

She doesn’t want him to be glad for it. Furiosa suddenly feels the hollowness of the Citadel around her and knows that she’d gutted it herself. She thinks of the War Boy she’d once held a knife to in a War Rig, but the girls— she’d found them such _children_ — they stopped her from shredding Nux. In the end, they’d been right, Nux had contributed so much, and the idea of it makes her tilt sideways and wonder at everything she thought she knew. Could Afterburn have contributed too, despite draining so fast?

Furiosa had thought he couldn’t. Had thought she was granting him the best he could hope for when he had nothing more to give. It had made sense at the time, had seemed like a compassionate thing to do. Now the thought sits like blood in her lungs.

She hopes the Vuvalini can't read it on her face. She had liked to think that she’d retained part of herself in the long years of working for Joe, but maybe that was merely wishful thinking.

“Why do you look so surprised,” Kompass asks, tilting into the room, leaning his good shoulder carefully against the door. The other is in a sling.

Furiosa flicks her gaze between the two War Boys. Kompass had been first station lead, tactical in charge of protecting the produce segment of her Rig and cover for Ace when her second was otherwise occupied. Most likely he had been whisked right off the War Rig when she’d barreled into the storm.

“You must have known,” Kompass continues, harshly, “that there would be no place for us, if we survived and returned. If Immortan Joe found us after you’ve run.”

“But you’re here.” Furiosa replies carefully, watching carefully, holding herself carefully. She puts her hand out to stay any movement from the women, because they are _here_ instead of having met up with Joe’s war parties. That they chose to come back for, what? A life in hiding? An execution? A death unawaited? Instead of seeking out glory with Joe’s war parties and trying to take her down. She tries to steady her feet but the world feels uneven around her.

“Better to have a use than out wandering,” the War Boy spits. He waves off Capable’s cry that that war boys, too, aren’t things, “Better to know our purpose.”

“Kompass,” Rachet begins.

“We discussed this,” he hisses back, and rounds onto Furiosa, “You need to tell us _why_.”

Furiosa rocked back. (“ _Kompass_ —” Rachet tries.)

“Immortan— no, no he’s _not_ , isn’t he?— _Joe_ would not have let us live, after, and we would have Witnessed each other for it, it wouldn’t have mattered, but. _Why didn’t you tell us_?”

“You would have stopped me,” Furiosa says, her stomach folds like steel and her throat feels hammered.

“ _Yes_ , we _would have_ !” he shouts and the women surge forward but Kompass does too and Rachet intercepts him, but the War Boy keeps speaking, “We would have _stopped_ you and prevented—” he breaks off, looking angry, “ _Look_ at you.”

And Furiosa stumbles and Kompass shoves past Rachet before anyone can catch him, and, roaring in frustration, he ducks under her arm before her leg collapses under her. Rachet darts over and braces her other side awkwardly, being shorter and slighter, and between the two of them they lower her kneeling into the pile of blankets that is her bed.

The women look perplexed, hands stopped in midair and slowly retracted, and the Vuvalini’s eyes are all narrow and thoughtful as Kompass carefully crashes his head to a section of her temple marginally less bloody and blue.

“So _mediocre_ ,” he mutters. “ _Look at you_.”

Furiosa’s mouth twists up wryly, Kompass eases them down to her mattress while Rachet can't meet her eyes as he helps, “You’ll need to talk to Ace, he was on Organic's ledge.”

“I saw,” Furiosa rasps. She settles against Ace’s second, a soothing warm bulk as he keeps careful weight on her wounds. Rachet leans around them, pulling towards them more blankets. The sounds and motions soothes her in its familiarity even if she’d rarely been the recipient. Even if they’d never been so watched by outsiders.

Furiosa feels too drained to care.

“I’ll get him,” Dag says, “Twisted-faced smeg, saw him reaching, didn’t think that—” She eyes the pile of them for a second and leaves without continuing. Cheedo follows after her, with a last look, hand already reaching out for a hand that meets hers.

“How many—” Furiosa breathes at the same time that Capable asks, “Are there more of you?”

“What’s it to you?” Kompass barks back. Rachet rolls his eyes as he finished arranging the bedding.

“Furiosa’s injured,” the redhead says, “we have two of the Many Mothers, War Pups too young to do War—”

“Never too young,” Rachet says.

“Not on Furiosa’s level,” Toast scoffs, “And we’re learning but—”

“ ‘Not on Furiosa’s level’,” Kompass mimics. But concedes, “Not many who are.”

Furiosa feels a brief pang at that, but knows that she couldn’t have asked the fool to stay.  Three times he’d left, and twice he returned on his own. She can’t keep him as an ally, as a thing; he will drift back to her if he was meant to.

It’s a bittersweet thought and she presses into it like a thumb against a muscle cramp, staring off into the middle distance.

Furiosa focuses back to the present at a soft sound, to see Capable and Toast exchanging looks with each other and the last of the Many. The Nightingale nods and steps towards the bed.

The old woman crouches down and places a canteen and a bag of jerky at the edge, staring down Furiosa’s crew. “Make sure she drinks and eats. Let us know if she starts bleeding again or if you don’t know what’s wrong.” Gale breaks off and says, “I may not always know what to do, but at least I know what’s what. There should be _someone_ in these rock heaps that can help us figure out the rest.”

Rachet nods at the elder and edges his arm under Furiosa’s head for a pillow. The women leave as he drags her thin sheet up over them and angles himself so that she can rest her bruises on his less injured side. Furiosa's throat is tight.

The canteen’s presented to her and she takes a careful mouthful, but it doesn’t help anything but her parchedness. She shakes her head at the jerky after just a nibble. They shift closer, preparing to rest.

“Ace?” She manages.

She feels Kompass shake his head against her shoulder. “He’ll keep.”

“You need the rest more,” Rachet explains.

Since it’s difficult at this point even to speak further, Furiosa would agree. She blinks her agreement, because nodding is too much, but between one blink and the next—

she sleeps.

 

* * *

 

“Ace.”

He jolts into wakefulness and immediately groans. He heals fast, always has, but his ribs are gonna need more than three days to be all chrome again.

“That’s you, right?”

The woman is tall and slim and sharp, shiny and chrome in the same way a dagger can be. To be admired perhaps, but to be treated with caution. She’s wearing boots and canvas pants, a wrapped top. Ace knows the story is that the Imperator stole Joe’s wives, but it’s hard to imagine this knife-woman passively undergoing anything.

(It’s hard to imagine Furiosa stealing anybody didn’t want to be stolen, not unless it was at the Immortan’s command, but he’s no longer as confident that he knows Furiosa.)

“Yeah,” he rasps out, rolling himself into a painful sitting position. He wonders what she could want from him.

“Furiosa’s asking for you,” she says, making a gesture for him to precede her.

Ace heaves himself to his feet, trying to tamp down on the urge to cough.

She makes him walk ahead of her, which is unpleasant and makes him wince every time he has to pause on the many stairs. If Furiosa wants to see him he’s probably not about to get stabbed in the back, but his skin is still crawling with this unfamiliar, hostile woman eying him like she’s not sure if she wants him dead.

“How’s the boss?” he wheezes, wanting her to talk.

“What’s it to you, War Boy?” she says sharply.

He stops and actually looks around at that, sees her at a careful few paces away, giving him an intensely skeptical look. There’s another woman behind her now, younger and wary, a colourful headband holding back her dark hair.

Ace doesn’t actually know what to say. What’s Furiosa to him? He’s her _Ace_ , has been for years - her second, her go-to. Nobody has ever questioned why he should care about her situation or her wellbeing - it’s so blindingly obvious that he wouldn’t know how to explain it.

Especially to somebody who can’t have known Furiosa for more than a couple of days.

“She looked—bad,” he says, because the glimpse he got of her was... as ghost pale as he’d ever seen her, like back when she still wore the war paint, and the faces of the women with her had looked grim. He hadn’t seen her leave the Organic Mechanic’s workshop— must have slipped asleep himself.

“She asked for you,” the dagger repeats, and Ace manages not to huff in dismissal, because his ribs would make him regret that. He only rolls his eyes; Furiosa asking after people means nothing. He’s convinced the boss would ask after people on her dying breath.

The knife woman tilts her head as if conceding the point, and steps up next to him, gesturing for him to start moving again. She’s still a careful arms’ length away, but it feels a little less hostile.

“I don’t know,” she finally says.

The younger woman says, soft enough to be a whisper, “She’s real hurt.”

"She was already hurt and then she.. she fought with Corpus' men," the dagger says.

It strikes him suddenly that these strange, shiny women are worried for Furiosa too. That they’re _protective_ , in their way. _Huh._

When they finally reach the hallway with Furiosa’s quarters, there are two pups in front of her door. Guarding, he thinks. They whisper, but the blonde woman with him just nods at them.

Her quarters must have been tossed when they discovered her betrayal, it’s like a twister went through, but all Ace can see is the pale face in the bed. Furiosa is not a small woman - not as tall or broad as him, but she doesn't need to be, she's an unstoppable force made of coiled steel and brimming with fire, imposing enough to stare down the most chromed up War Boys. Imposing enough to intimidate even Rictus.

She looks small and pale tucked between the bulk of Kompass and Rachet, like a salvaged engine that's just barely idling, and any desire he might have had to shout at her until she shouts back and explains herself to him disappears.

Ace sinks down by the foot of the mattress, sweeps aside some broken possessions to make space to lie down. His ribs ache and his breath comes as short, painful wheezing.

“Here,” says a soft voice, and it’s the younger woman, the one with dark hair and wide eyes.

She’s holding out a cushion to him, weight on the balls of her feet like she’s ready to dart back. He accepts it slowly and nods his thanks, breathing a little easier when he’s propped himself up on it. He extends one arm onto the mattress, cupping his hand around Furiosa’s slender ankle, and doesn’t even notice when the women leave the room.

 

**Author's Note:**

> If you're interested in the crazy process of the writing of this fic, you might enjoy [these](http://primarybufferpanel.tumblr.com/tagged/Fic%3A-the-mountains-are-the-same) [tags](http://bonehandledknife.tumblr.com/tagged/adventures-in-co-writing) [right](http://primarybufferpanel.tumblr.com/tagged/The-bonehandledknife-%26-primarybufferpanel-cowriter-relationship) [here](http://bonehandledknife.tumblr.com/tagged/the-mountains-are-the-same)

**Works inspired by this one:**

  * [[PODFIC] Arête](https://archiveofourown.org/works/8538472) by [Primarybufferpanel (ArwenLune)](https://archiveofourown.org/users/ArwenLune/pseuds/Primarybufferpanel)




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